This feature appears in the February ‘16 issue of NRA America’s 1st Freedom, one of the official journals of the National Rifle Association.
To push the gun-ban agenda of President Barack Obama and presidential wannabe Hillary Clinton, the most powerful voices in the dying mainstream media are centering their attacks on the National Rifle Association. Their irrational fear of us is matched by their loathing and blind hatred of every ordinary American who owns firearms.
As someone who has spent more than 50 years in this everlasting battle between truth and lies, between an elitist media and millions of peaceable gun owners, I can tell you that the intensity of the media assault today is off the scale.
With Hillary Clinton declaring that the demise of the NRA will be her number one target if she is elected president in November, the venom for the NRA from her crowd will only increase. They detest guns and they hate us for being free to own them in peace.To the vengeful media, Wayne is the embodiment of the NRA, and I say, “God bless him” for that.
After the slaughter of celebrants at a San Bernardino, Calif., Christmas party last December by a man-and-wife team, truly horrible things were said about the NRA by the elite media—far worse than anything directed at the terrorists.
The New York Times ran its first front-page editorial since 1920, using that special space to demand confiscation of firearms from American citizens. As the newspaper put it:
“It is a moral outrage and a national disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency. These are weapons of war, … deliberately marketed as tools of macho vigilantism and even insurrection.” They demand federal action that “would require Americans who own those kinds of weapons to give them up for the good of their fellow citizens.”
How about The New York Times shutting down its presses for the good of fellow citizens?
The New York Daily News is even worse—referring to the nation’s oldest civil rights organization as “The Vile NRA,” then calling us terrorists and mass murderers. I won’t dignify their hatred with direct quotes, but you can find them on the Internet.
All of this comes because we are the only force that stands in the way of the freedom-crushing agenda that they have in mind.
“The Vile NRA?” As in 5 million citizens working tirelessly to save American liberty; to uphold the right of every citizen to keep and bear arms; and to preserve and protect for all Americans the right to assemble, publish, broadcast and speak.
The same day that the Times broke its page 1 dry spell, the paper ran an inside editorial that was headlined, “Fear Ignorance, Not Muslims.” Referring to the FBI’s investigation of the San Bernardino Islamic terrorists, the Times warned: “Americans must guard against overreaction, and subdue the panicked reflex of distrust and hatred of Americans who are Muslims.” Who could argue with that?
Yet, let’s revisit that lofty thought with a twist that defines the Times’ own aggressive ignorance:
“Americans must guard against overreaction, and subdue the panicked reflex of distrust and hatred of Americans” who are law-abiding gun owners.
The Times’ blind hatred for one-third of the nation’s adult population—the 100 million souls who peaceably own firearms—is stunning in its intolerance.
Much of this ugly media poison is aimed personally at NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre. I can tell you from knowing him for over 40 years, a better, more courageous, selfless and decent man has never crossed our path. In reality, the National Rifle Association of America is made up of individual, peaceable citizens who have assembled—as protected by the First Amendment—to make our voices heard.
To the vengeful media, Wayne is the embodiment of the NRA, and I say, “God bless him” for that. America owes him a huge debt of thanks.
But where Wayne is the face of the NRA, the NRA is not Wayne LaPierre. He is simply one among us whom we have chosen to most ably lead and represent our cause.
In reality, the National Rifle Association of America is made up of individual, peaceable citizens who have assembled—as protected by the First Amendment—to make our voices heard.
We are law-abiding people with a common bond. We represent every shade of politics, and every description of citizenry imaginable by race, color or religion. We are America.
Beyond that, we have a reach through our friends, family, colleagues and co-workers that eclipses the cratered circulation of a dying media spreading spittle-laced diatribes against us.
I’ve got a message for the haters: When you insult or vilify us, you smear tens of millions more good people. We draw energy from that and then we work harder to save our liberty from such hatred, ignorance and bigotry. (p.s. We work for your freedom as well.)
The NRA’s prime mission is simple enough: to protect all of the pre-existing rights that the Founders recognized as inalienable for all of the people of our great nation.
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